It’s normal for people to sleep less than usual in the winter because reduced exposure to light signals the body to produce melatonin, a hormone that makes us sleepy.
Although many of us seek to sleep during the winter months, humans – unlike many other mammals – do not have the ability to hibernate.
But a newly published study investigated whether early humans had this ability at some point. The findings, while surprisingly preliminary, reveal that early humans did just that, even if they weren’t very good at it.
And some scientists believe that the ability to hibernate could provide a range of potential benefits, from preventing damage from heart attacks and strokes to staving off hunger and even making space travel is possible.
Scientist studying hibernation in dwarf lemurs at Duke University in the USA. Marina Blanco told Good Health: “Hibernation in humans may be more science than fiction. It can help us survive active crises – for example, seasonal food shortages – to deal with serious infections by preventing organ damage and increasing lifespan.”
And when it comes to injury, the problem is that when blood flow suddenly returns to blocked tissues, such as after a heart attack or stroke, it can cause fatal shock.
But Dr Michael Ambler, a clinical lecturer at the University of Bristol, said research in mice showed that this shock was greatly reduced if you kept them cool when blood flow returned to their veins.
Ambler says one of the main reasons for this is that the cold “reduces metabolic activity primarily in the mitochondria, which are the power stations inside the cell.”
When the blood returns, the mitochondria are quickly activated, producing potentially harmful byproducts. This means slowing their progression once blood flow is restored, lowering body temperature and protecting vital organs from this massive activity.
Hibernation is a state of minimal activity and slowed metabolism that some animals, such as hedgehogs, bats, and brown bears, enter and is characterized by low heart rate, body temperature, and low energy intake. oxygen. This allows animals to cope with cold and lack of food and can last for days, weeks or even months, depending on the species.
Some animals also benefit from a similar but shorter state called circadian hibernation, which can be an important part of energy conservation at any time of the year and is unrelated to the seasons.
In this case, body temperature, breathing rate, heart rate and metabolic rate decrease.
But unlike hibernation, diurnal lethargy appears to be an involuntary state that an animal enters when it needs to conserve energy – for example, many birds and small rodents, such as mice and hamsters, hibernate regularly when lack of food
But animals are not the only ones who do this. And evidence from the bones of one of the world’s most important paleontological sites, a cave called Sima de los Huesos (Bone Pit) in Atapuerca in northern Spain, suggests that early humans may have escaped hundreds of thousands of years ago. that was long ago. extreme cold through winter sleep.
According to an article published in the journal L’Anthropology, the fossils in the cave show seasonal variations, indicating that bone growth is impaired for several months each year.
The researchers say that these early humans “found themselves in metabolic states that helped them survive for long periods of time in extremely cold conditions with limited food supplies and adequate fat stores in the body.” In other words, they are in a state of hibernation. “
And while humans no longer hibernate or hibernate every day, growing evidence suggests we can trigger biological mechanisms to do so.
“Humans, like other mammals, may already have a biological mechanism for hibernation, but we need to know how to activate, regulate and coordinate all the necessary processes. This mechanism is basically information stored in our genes,” explained Dr. Blank. .
Source: Daily Mail
Source: Arabic RT
